A KAYAKER on an epic journey paddling round Britain for charity made it to Gwynedd – only to have his boat stolen.

Heartless thieves took James Bonell’s kayak and navigation gear worth over £3,000 from the harbour at Trefor.

The 24-year-old had paddled just 400 miles of his 3,000-mile sea adventure when he stopped for the night in the village on the Llyn Peninsula on Thursday.

He was devastated the next morning to find his kayak had disappeared, just three weeks into his trip.

James, an engineer by trade, has taken six months off work to complete the journey.

He hopes to raise money for colitis and Crohn's Disease charity NACC, after his sister was diagnosed with the bowel disease Crohn's two years ago.

Yesterday he told how he’d bolted the 20ft kayak to railings near Trefor harbour, and set off to a friend’s house in the village for the night.

But when he came back he found it had been cut free from the fence. Mr Bonell is now frantically trying to replace his kayak and equipment so he can continue with the rest of his journey. He said: “I was absolutely gutted when I saw that the kayak had been stolen.

“I’ve got a support van and driver travelling with me inland who does most of the fundraising and we usually put the kayak on top of it when we stop, but when I arrived in Trefor I though it was a nice, quiet seaside village and it would be okay to leave it there.

“It was obvious that they used bolt cutters to free the kayak.

“It was a big kayak, you needed two people to carry it and more than likely it was driven in a van or on a trailer from the beach because it is too difficult to carry something of that size away and not get noticed.

“The response from local people has been fantastic, a lot of people have come forward and offered to lend us the gear until the end of the trip.”

Mr Bonell added: “The theft’s been a big setback but it only took around 30 seconds for me to get over it and realise it’s just kit at the end of the day.

“It’s a setback but I didn’t think for a moment about throwing in the towel.

“If I finish this I think I will be the first person to go down, across and around Britain, which is an extra reason to carry on.”